Aaron the Moor
Aaron the Moor is the main antagonist of Shakespeare's 1594 play Titus Andronicus. He is a slave-turned-lover of the vindictive Goth-turned-Roman empress Tamora, and while initially seeming like a subservient agent merely wanting to help her exact her revenge, it's eventually revealed that Aaron is in actuality a sick, sadistic individual who revels in the misery he causes, making him the true source of evil in the play. History Before the play, Aaron spent his time raping women, burning down barns, killing livestock, deceiving friends into killing each other and digging up dead people to prop up against the doors of their loved ones. In the play, Titus steps down as emperor of Rome, and the petulant Saturninus is chosen to be the new emperor. However, Saturninus chooses to marry Tamora, the previous queen of the Goths whom Titus defeated in warfare, and whose son he sacrificed as part of a religious ritual, so Tamora develops a desire to ruin Titus's life. Enter Aaron, who's Tamora's lover, unbeknownst to Saturninus. Aaron gets Tamora's two living sons, Chiron and Demetrius, to rape Lavinia, Titus's daughter, and mutilate her horribly so she cannot reveal the perpetrators to anyone. Aaron then arranges the death of Bassianus, Saturnisus's brother, and frames two of Titus's sons, Quintus and Martius. Aaron tells Titus that his two sons will be spared if a hand is given, and Titus readily invites Aaron to chop off his hand. However, later Aaron sends to Titus the severed heads of Quintus and Martius, flanking his severed-off hand, crushing the old man further. Near the end of the play, Tamora gives birth to a baby who is obviously Aaron's (as evinced by his dark skin), and Aaron becomes obsessed with it, calling it his flesh and heir. He slaughters the midwife and the nurse, as they are witnesses, and flees, wanting to wean his child on berries and raise him to be a terrible warrior like himself in a dark cave, but he's stopped by Lucius, Titus's remaining son, who recognizes Aaron as the true orchestrator of all the misery. Aaron forces Lucius to spare his heir to hear the truth, and when Lucius obliges him, Aaron gleefully admits to all of his crimes, delighting in Lucius's disgusted reactions. Moreover, Aaron starts ranting and raving about all his previous, unrelated crimes, and declares he wishes he could've done so much more evil. Lucius decides hanging is too merciful for this incarnate devil, and instead buries him chest-deep in sand to starve in the desert. What Makes Him Pure Evil * Raping, killing, burning, mutilating and tormenting regularly even before the play starts. * Arranging the rape of Lavinia, and ordering her hands and tongue be cut off, so she will live in agony and forever be unable to communicate to her family the cause. Aaron later described this act to Lucius, her brother, as "trimming" her. * Planning the brutal murder of Bassianus, just to frame and execute Quintus and Martius. The most heinous part of this is certainly when he gives Titus false hope that cutting off his hand will save them, before proffering him their heads along with the bloody hand. * Killing two innocent women just because they found out about his bastard child. He even jokes that one of them sounded like a "pig ready for the spit" after impaling her. * Doing all of this for the express purpose of sick, sadistic satisfaction. Trivia * Aaron is often viewed as the evilest of all Shakespeare villains, only perhaps tied with Richard III. External links * Aaron the Moor on the Villains Wiki Category:Psychopath Category:Sadists Category:Rapists Category:Charismatic Category:Male Category:Hate Sink Category:Murderer Category:Homicidal Category:Deviants Category:Misanthropes Category:Book Pure Evil's